CHAPTER FOUR
Duff placed the rope on Watters’ desk. “It’s a length of a foreganger, according to the foreman of Wilson’s rope maker’s yard.”
“A foreganger? What the devil is a foreganger?” Scuddamore asked.
Duff smiled, happy to educate his colleague. “A foreganger is the line that attaches a whaling harpoon to the much heavier whaling line. It’s flexible,” Duff twisted the rope in his hands, “and sufficiently strong for the whale not to snap it.”
“Who do we know with a whaling connection?” Watters asked.
“Mr Muirhead,” Scuddamore replied at once.
“Coincidence? Or not.” Watters poured himself a mug of tea. “Mr Mackay ordered us to leave the scuttling aside,” he reminded, “but we’ll keep it in mind, gentlemen.”
Scuddamore opened his notebook. “I spoke to everybody in the close,” he s
